


The Canary and the Professor

by Chaerring



Category: Marvel (Movies), The Avengers (2012), Thor (2011)
Genre: AU, Assault, Attempted Molestation, Bruce is a professor, But the Hulk is the hero, Darcy is a singer, F/M, Pseudo-noir, Steve Rogers would feel right at home, bit more than canon typical violence, dictionary included, excessive slang, noir, what am I writing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-05-22
Updated: 2012-05-22
Packaged: 2017-11-05 20:12:28
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,276
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/410539
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Chaerring/pseuds/Chaerring
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A pseudo noir tale about a canary who walks home in the dark and meets a big green cat. </p><p> </p><p>For those unfamiliar with noir slang a dictionary link is included. A canary is a singer, a cat is a man. I don't think anything is real trigger-y and nothing is very explicit, but mind the tags, please.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Canary and the Professor

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: None of the characters are mine.
> 
> Thanks to TheGreatSporkWielder for beta-ing.
> 
> [Miskatonic's Noir Slang Dictionary](http://www.miskatonic.org/slang.html) for all you translation needs.

It was darker out on the streets than Darcy had thought it would be. Some of the streetlights were going out and the city hadn't bothered to repair them in this part of town yet. The surrounding nightclubs weren't helping either with their bright neon signs and the heavy smoke from their doors ruining her night vision. She clutched her wrap tighter around her shoulders and picked up her pace ever so slightly. She probably should have taken Jane and Thor's offer to walk her home or call her a cab and even pay for it. The strange cat would have done it too, he was so dizzy with that dame, but even though Darcy drank out of the same bottle as Jane, there was still a barrier there. Darcy was just a canary, a good one to be sure. Maybe good enough to get a record one day if the right person heard her, but Jane, she was a broad with a future. Learning all that science from her pop and finding strange cats in the desert to bring home. Strange _handsome_ cats at that. No, Darcy wasn't going to gum that up by taking her friend's dough. She'd never be able to square it with them.

Besides, she was having a good night. The Mysterious Professor had come in again to listen to her croon and he had stayed the whole night. Jane teased her mercilessly for putting on her best and maybe hiking up her breasts a little extra when she realized he was in the club, but Darcy just wanted to get his attention and hold it. He never seemed to be like the other cats that came in and hooted at her. He clapped politely and smiled ever so sweet and small when she looked at him during a set, but those sorts of thoughts weren't what she needed while walking home alone.

She did pick up her pace when someone stepped out of an alley she had passed and started following her. She wasn't too worried yet. She had a little iron in her handbag and she knew how to use it. Hated it, wished it were something a little less permanent, but she knew how to pump metal. It was too damn bad another damned dirty hood stepped in front of her from out of the next alley. He had a long shiv and held it like he had practice. She tried to pop the clasp on her handbag, but they were fast. The first one got her hair from behind dragging her backwards through the smoky fog into the alley and the second one twisted her wrist something hard until she heard her bones crack like the ruler at her old Catholic school. Her handbag hit the ground with a thump that echoed in her ribs and she screamed. 

The hoods were hissing something pressing the shiv to her neck and threatening, but she didn't think, didn't listen to them. If she did she'd stop screaming and she really would be chilled off. It wasn't until she felt a hand across her face that she stopped her wails and then only because the pain surprised her. She'd lost her wrap somewhere and the dirty redhots were trying to lay hands on her in a way she'd never let any man. She slung her fist out and kicked her leg back trying anything at all to make an impression, to send back that pain even as she drew a painful breath to scream again. 

Then her second scream was overpowered by something that sounded a lot worse. 

The roar was the loudest thing she'd ever heard. Louder than the shot that had killed her Pop and louder than Thor's laugh. It was full of rage and sorrow like she'd never heard. It rattled her bones and, most importantly, froze her attackers. She threw herself sideways out of their grasps, taking advantage of the moment. She twisted around on the ground cradling her wrist just in time to see the alley entrance darken with a huge figure. She couldn't see well through the haze at first, but then the thing reached forward with two gigantic _green_ hands. They weren't bruise green either, but honest to God greener than the ink on a dollar bill. He gripped the crooks like rag dolls and tossed them against the wall with sickening crunches like they weren't so much as a paper balls. 

She stared unsure whether to be glad or nauseous at the angle of their necks and the red spatter on the alley wall. She told herself it was paint and that she had bigger -- _much bigger_ \-- things to worry about at the moment. Her savior loomed in the entrance of the alleyway as she pulled herself to her feet awkwardly with one arm. There was no way she'd be able to make it past him if she was brave enough to try. The enormous cat filled up the entire opening. She wasn't sure how those shoulders even existed. His foot cracked the ground beneath their feet when he stepped forward. Darcy swallowed and looked up, up, _up_ into his face. She was used to looking up at people, especially at cats and other broads in their heels, but this guy, he was a whole other story.

She held her breath as he leaned down out of the haze above her and she finally caught sight of his face. Darcy nearly laughed out loud at herself. He was just a man. A green enormous man with the power to toss large grown men around, but still his face and eyes were a man's. It was a bigger relief than she thought it would be, not to see fangs and the terrifying red eyes of a monster. She smiled at him and swayed with the exhaustion and shock of it all. Then she was being lifted, his hands spanning her entire body gently. She tried her best to ignore what she had seen those hands do not two minutes ago. He settled her into the joint of his elbow and then turned sideways sinking slowly to the ground watching her the whole time as he held her close. 

His body was hot, even through the pieces of tattered suit clinging to him like he'd outgrown it, but it felt good in place of her missing wrap in the cold night air. His green skin under her bare shoulder was an oddly soft covering to the steel of muscle she could feel beneath. Her wrist was throbbing and swelling and she still needed to get home, but for the moment she wanted nothing that to stay there where she was safe. 

She almost jumped out of her skin when his chest rumbled beneath her and he spoke.

**"Puny hoods no hurt Hulk's moll."**

Darcy pulled back a little to look up into his face. _His moll?_ Presuming he was "Hulk", but when did that happen?

"Hey, big cat. When did you decide I was your moll? I need to know these things."

And the green guy just raised his bushy eyebrow at her disappearing it into his mop of hair as she stared at his face. Then, as though he'd been waiting for her undivided attention, his lips moved twisting up ever so small and sweet and she saw it. It was all there in his face, just enlarged and color changed. Her mysterious professor had come to her rescue. She grinned and pushed up a little with her good arm to give his nose a peck with her lips.

"Okay. I'm your moll."

**Author's Note:**

> I have no clue what this was, ~~but there will be at least one more chapter after I pump out another chapter of Foreign Teas.~~
> 
> Edit: I will probably make a sequel when But I Linger On, Dear, and the Sleeping With the Team Captains series aren't eating my mind.


End file.
